Before his bail was hiked from $100,000 to $500,000 on Friday, a friend of Aksal had agreed to post the bail.

But at a bail hearing today, the defense attorney for Aksal, Robert DeGroot, said Aksal's friend could not post bail for $500,000.

The friend had offered his share of his $1.3 million Hoboken brownstone as collateral.
DeGroot said he would talk to US Magistrate Judge Madeline Cox Arleo and make an offer for bail to be set somewhere between $100,000 and $500,000.

Prosecutors allege Aksal abused a sleeping stranger on an Aug. 20 flight from Phoenix to Newark.

Aksal has been in custody since his August arrest, and cannot be released until the bail appeal is heard.

Aksal has pleaded not guilty to a sexual abuse charge. He denied through his attorney that he harmed the woman, whom he said he did not know. The woman's name has not been released because of the nature of the charges.

The woman told authorities she dozed off wearing headphones and awoke to find her blouse ripped, her bra broken and pulled around her waist, and Aksal with one hand on her breast and another inside her shorts.

Prosecutors said Aksal is a flight risk, arguing that the Turkish-born United States citizen had U.S. and Turkish passports under different names, scant local ties, two U.S. properties drained of their equity, a daughter in London and family in Turkey.